His fingers trace the measurements and the instructions. For the length of a breath,he’s somewhere else entirely.
Ailsa bounces over, all sunshine and curls. ‘Ready to start? The ingredients are all prepped.’
‘Aye.’ Grit in his voice. ‘Let’s do this.’
Ailsa hands him the first bowl of ingredients. He blanks for a second, like he’s forgotten how hands work, before he takes it with a muttered ‘cheers’ and sets it down with unnecessary force.
He’s expectedly monosyllabic, but Ailsa is a bundle of charm. And Brodie’s transformation is subtle but unmistakable. His stance relaxes by degrees, movements losing that wound-spring tension. When Ailsa asks about the recipe’s origins, his answers flow more easily.
‘Nonna came from Naples in the sixties, met Grandda, and opened a café in Edinburgh.’ His hands work the meatballs with practised ease.
‘And your mum learned from them?’
‘Aye. Every recipe, every trick.’ A ghost of a smile touches his lips. ‘She’d let me help, even when I made a mess of everything.’
Something hot and disobedient unfurls deep behind my navel. This gentle version of Brodie sends warning signals firing through my brain and body.
The studio lights paint his forearms in gold as he works. Those hands that can send a rugby ball spiralling sixty metres now shape meat with surprising delicacy. The sauce bubbles, rich and red, filling the air with garlic and herbs.
‘Smells amazing.’ Ailsa stirs the pot. ‘You clearly know your way around a kitchen.’
‘Only with this.’ He shrugs. ‘Everything else is beans on toast.’
My lips tug upward, but I force them flat.
‘So.’ Ailsa’s tone remains light, but her eyes sharpen. ‘While we wait for the sauce, can we talk about what happened at the beginning of this year?’
We’d briefly discussed this possibility in prep, and he’d agreed. Still, the wooden spoon in Brodie’s hand stills. Heat prickles across the back of my neck.
‘The gambling,’ Ailsa clarifies.
The word drops like a stone. Ripples of tension spread through the studio. I straighten, ready to intervene, but…
‘Aye,’ he says. ‘We can talk about it.’
What? Is he really going…there?
‘It’s simple.’ He keeps stirring, eyes on the sauce. ‘I’m competitive. Always have been. Three boys, strict dad – everything was a competition. Who could run fastest, study hardest, win biggest. So I guess you could say I don’t have a gambling problem. I have a competition problem.’
‘Makes sense to me.’ Ailsa smiles and nods, encouraging.
‘Poker seemed perfect. Strategy, skill, that rush when you win.’ His jaw grinds. ‘I got caught up in it. Lost more than I should’ve. But I never…’ His eyes cut to me, sharp as glass, ‘…bet on rugby. Never. That was bullsh—…lies someone fed to the media.’
Warmth spreads its way upward all the way to my ears. Because he’s right, isn’t he? Someone leaked those rumours to the press. Someone made sure they stuck.
But that someone wasn’t me, even though Brodie seems to believe otherwise. I had no reason to do that. I was busy trying to build up Callum’s sponsorship deals and…
‘The headlines must have hurt.’ Ailsa says gently. ‘Your reputation—’
‘Got torched.’ His laugh holds no humour. ‘Amazing how quick people turn on you, isn’t it? One rumour, and suddenly you’re toxic.’
Guilt sits like lead in my gut. Was it Callum? Logically, it makes sense. Brodie left the Knights, and now Callum’s their starting fly-half. His market value has doubled, and he’s up for the national team. Something Brodie had his eye on, too. If Brodie had stayed, Callum would still be in his shadow. But with him gone, suddenly Callum’s not just a contender. He’sthecontender.
Would he have been that calculated? I never thought he was the strategic type. But then again, I also never thought he’d pound another woman while I was working my butt off to make him a star. Perhaps I wasn’t just blind to Callum’s lies. Perhaps I was blind to what he was willing to do to get what he wanted.
Brodie thinks I was in on it, helped ruin his career.
And maybe I was. By staying with the man who did.
